Week Thirty Six in Ecuador - July 28, 2014 - Very Busy Times!!!

Hey Family!

So this week was awesome cause we had a baptism!!! It was sweet her name is Investigator E. and she is 15 and she was an old investigator. She has had a super hard life so it has been cool to see what amazing miracles the gospel can do for people who are in trouble and need help. I had the opportunity to baptize her and it was great. I'm feeling really good being here in Malvinas and being able to teach the people here!

This last Sunday was awesome because we had 8 investigators in church and 6 of them are getting ready for their baptisms. So this week has been super productive and we have been working extremely hard. But I love it when I work hard!! I feel better so I just want to keep going and going. Haha also something I have been learning these last few days is that when you teach people you have to make it fun and be able to enjoy the circumstances that you are in. For instance just inviting everyone in the world to go to church and be baptized. The last week we have been putting goals on how many péople we can invite to be baptized and it's great cause we just talk to everybody in the streets and invite them all to follow Christ like what our objective is. And I've been loving it! We have talked to the funniest weirdest people but also we've found a ton of péople who are really ready to recieve the Gospel and they have accepted our invitations, I have trully been gaining a strong testimony that God really does just put people in front of me to teach..... I just have to talk to them and be able to listen to the spirit to do so.  

I have loved this last week....also I can't remember if I told you guys but the other two elders left our house so now I am with Elder Adamson and Elder Cordova who are both from the U.S. And it has been fun the last week to be able to goof around with them. Because we are crazy in the house but we arte working really hard so it's sweet.

This last Friday was the like Independence Day for Guayaquil so there were a ton of parties and it was pretty crazy here in Malvinas. We were constantly watching out for drunk people, but luckily nothing bad happened. Only scary part is  I saw at least 10 different people get robbed that night (I'm totally serious), but God protects his missionaries so nothing happened with us :)

 

Oh and I love you all....tell Grandpa he is the greatest and I love him to death.

Well hope all is well....until next week Elder Lignell

 P.S.

The picture is of our zone building a house for a service project this week. 

A bunch of returned missionaries that served here like 20 years ago came back to do service here and they asked for our helped so we helped them out on Thursday and it was awesome!!! I got to use normal clothes outside for the first time in like 9 months hahahaha

 

Love,

Elder Lignell

                              Investigator E. on Her Baptism Day

                      Service Project with Returned Missionaries....Way Fun!!

 

Week Thirty Five in Ecuador - July 21, 2014 - Learning How To Handle Stress

Hey family! Ya so I am doing well right now only that I am super stressed but I will talk about that a little bit later. 

Okay first off, I have not recieved my package yet :( hopefully soon.

Second, I am glad all is well with you guys!  

That's cool that you and Dad looked up Malvinas....it really is super poor and pretty sketchy but oh well I havent gotten robbed here yet :)

Ok now about this week. So this week went well but it was pretty "loco" So first off the baptism date that we had programed for this week went to another part of Ecuador for a vacation. He told us that he would be back before his baptism and that he was super excited about his baptism... however he has yet to make it back from his trip and now it is getting close to two weeks that he has been gone and we haven't heard anything from him, so maybe he just left for good and won't come back. I guess we'll see what goes down this next week.

 Then the two other missionaries that we were living with, the zone leaders, on Friday they both left the area. They worked in the same ward as us in Malvinas, so when they left, they left us with their whole program of people that they were visiting and that were being prepared to be baptized. Therefore now we have the whole wards' investigators just for us... I should have two baptisms this week two the next week two the next week and then the following has three more. And so right about now it is pretty stressful to try to manage everybody together, it's literally like I gained double responsibility. Also we have two new zone leaders now and they are both gringos... one is from Washington and the other is from Utah and they are both sweet. They work crazy hard and it's been fun getting to know them. 

Anyway this week went well. It was a little funny because I told my companion the other day that I would feel comfortable right now to have a ton of people preparing to be baptized. So I think God heard me and thought it would be funny to just dump a ton of people in my lap to be baptized. haha But don't think I am complaining I am extremely happy about all of it. It's fun to be busy out here and always have a bunch of stuff to do. I've been learning a ton on how to control my stress and how to keep investigators interested in what we are teaching. To be completely honest I never realized before my mission how tricky it is to teach the Gospel and have success. You have to really find out who the people are that you are teaching and you have to know them inside and out. You have to be able to make them laugh and relate everything from the Gospel to their lives, and if you don't they get uninterested and don't feel like the Gospel is personal for them. So you always have to be on your toes when you are teaching and all of your energy has to be put into them... haha being a missionary is exhausting mentally and physically. I am always tired out here but it's a good tired and I'm sure I'll have time to sleep when I get back.

Anyways, love you all so much. I keep you in my prayers every night.

Love,

 

Elder Lignell

Week Thirty Four in Ecuador - July 14, 2014 - First Baptism in My New Territory

Hi Everyone:

Well, I had my first baptism here this last Saturday and it was awesome!

Everything is good with my new companion, Elder Garcia. We have been working hard and are going to keep working hard. We have another possible baptism for this next Saturday! Hopefully all goes well! I'll need you all to pray for him a bunch his name is Investigator A., he is 16 and he is like six feet tall and black. He is great and I hope so bad to be able to baptize him this next Saturday!

That's sweet about Jake... I am so glad he had a great time at EFY that is so awesome. I hope he was outgoing and able to make a ton of new friends! 

Anyways this week has been good. It has been a little hard because we don't have very many people to work with right now... so our biggest trial as of right now is to be able to find others who are interested in listening to us and want to progress. Our sector is well..... interesting..... it honestly is extremely dangerous. However, Mom don't worry about me, I am fine and I feel safe here. However the other day we did have a guy rob a girl under our house with a giant machete and we heard screaming and saw the whole thing go down. But luckily no one got hurt and our other neighbor chased the robber down with a giant 4 by 4 hahaha. Other than that the week has been calm and I've noticed if you just don't show fear nobody does anything to you here :) 

Then this Saturday we had the baptism!!! It was awesome!!! or as you would say here cheverisimo! haha but it was funny because we had everything set up for him to be baptized at 6:00 at night however when we passed by his house he wasn't ready so he told us that he would meet us at the church in five minutes so we left and were waiting for him. Then after waiting for a while we see him fly by passing us on a motorcycle with a girl on the back driving away from the church... haha so obviously I was thinking all kinds of things at that moment; that he didn't want to go through with it, that the girl had invited him to do something else or whatever else that could happen. haha so we ran back to his house to ask what had happened and the mom just told us that he left and she didn't know where... so I was way stressed out at that point, haha but then just as I was about to leave his house he came back and explained to us how he had to take his sister to a friend's house and that's why he left. Thern we walked over to the church together and he got baptized so it all worked out :)

And ya that was my week, (semana), I learned a lot about patience and not stressing out. I love this work and I am excited for the next week, but please keep me in your prayers :)

 

I'm attaching a picture of my Zone Leader carrying me....he is from Peru and he is a Giant! He dressed up like a ninja or something and started play fighting all of us (yes, we all turn a little bit weird here :)) and he lifted me up and my companion grabbed a picture!  His name is Elder Serpa and the other Zone Leader is Elder Westover and he is from Utah.  They make me laugh all the time.

 

 

       Elder Serpa Playing Like a Ninja (yes, we all act a little nerdy out here!)

 

 

                                Our First Baptisms in Our New Territory

 

Well I love you all so much hope this week goes well for you all!

 

Elder Lignell

Week Thirty Three in Ecuador - July 7, 2014 - My Testimony

Hey family:

 I am so glad that mom had a great time at girls camp that is awesome!

So yes, I have a new companion and he is great.... well he's a little slow and hasn't learned too much in his six months out here. However, that's okay I just have a little bit more work to do and I have to do all the talking with the investigators but it is helping me learn a ton so I love it :) 

The switch to the new house was all good, although my new house is super small haha but oh well will figure everything all out.

Okay and now about my week.  Well to be honest not too much happened this week. 

We had a little mishap with our ward mission leader when he offered to wash our clothes for us and then expected us to pay him and I was like "oh okay how much do you want" and he says 65 dollars for three bags of clothing.... and obviously we don't have that kind of money so I had to tell him that we couldn't pay him that much that the most we could give was 10 bucks.....he was NOT very happy about that :) 

Then for the rest of the week I was just getting adjusted to being senior companion. We have met two new people that are great that have accepted baptism dates and I am so excited to keep working with them! 

I would like to bare a little testimony to wrap things up:

Okay so the last little bit of my time out here I have learned a lot about myself. About how hard I can push myself and about the effort that I want to put into my work as a missionary. I have discovered that the only way to be happy out here is when you are working as hard as you can. I have realized that God truly does put people that are prepared to be taught right in your path. He wants every single one of us in this life to be happy. He knows me better than I know myslef and he knows just how hard I can push myself. I want to be able to say that I reached my potential as a disciple of Christ out here and that I was able to find those in need of the gospel and that I was able to change their lives. 

I love this work and I love the time that I have here. I hope that every single one of you all can find the same joy that I have found here. I hope that you all can know without a doubt that Jesus Christ is your Savior and that he loves you. I hope that our family can be together forever. Because I have truly relized here how much family means. I have seen so many broken families here and I am so grateful for mine that I have in Utah. I love you all so very much and I will talk to you soon next Monday :)

 

Love,

 Elder Lignell

Week Thirty Two in Ecuador - June 30, 2014 - A New Companion :)

Hey guys :) Well I'm doing great down here however there have been a few pretty big changes. So first off I am no longer junior companion. I have been switched to senior companion and my new companion's name is Elder Garcia. He also happens to be from Mexico, but he only has 6 months out here in his mission. So it has been sweet to have the opportunity to be senior companion and do everything the way that I would like to however it is also a ton more stress. 

I am now in a new area but I am still in Guayaquil. The area is called Malvinas. And it is great however the area is pretty dangerous. It is by far the poorest area that I have been in so far and there are a ton of problems with drugs... So it is a little sketchy. You have to be really carefull where you go in the area in night or else you'll get robbed. But don't worry mom I am being careful. 

Other than that the church that we meet at is super small however the ward is awesome and they stick about 150 members in the building every sunday and if you guys could see how small the building is you would be impressed. 

Also we have two baptism dates set up for the 12th of July and I am stoked for them to go through. They are two kids that are 16 they are best friends and they are awesome! They have loved going to church and I'm excited to continue to help them prepare to get baptized. 

So ya I am doing great out here. I was way sad to leave Maracaibo.... that ward was the best and I was so sad to leave Elder Sanchez. We worked harder than anyone out there. And we were just starting to see all the miracles from our efforts as I left... :( But I learned so much from Elder Sanchez and I am so grateful for the time that I had with him. )

Also I am exctited to work here as senior companion. I mean now I have the chance to just work and teach and show everyone the type of missionary I am going to be for my mission. So there is a lot of pressure but it's okay I am excited to push forward and keep working. :)

I love you all so very much. That's sick that Jake won is game and I am glad you get to do girls camp again mom.

Well unfortunately I didn't get the package yet... hopefully next week.

 But other than that all is well

 I'm excited to work and work and work with my new comp. 

 Love, Elder Lignell

                               My New Companion, Elder Garcia, is 2nd from the right.

                                                 Me and Elder Myers (A good friend)